A South African company said on Thursday that it was bidding to build a Formula One race circuit near Cape Town’s international airport at an estimated cost of R1-billion. David Gant, chief executive of the South African Grand Prix Corporation, told reporters the project could be scuttled by land problems.
The last AM Live radio show to be hosted by John Perlman will be on Friday, the SABC said. ”Friday is the last day,” said SABC spokesperson Kaizer Kganyago. The popular broadcaster resigned in January after nine years of presenting the morning current-affairs programme.
Federal Reserve chairperson Ben Bernanke said on Wednesday this week’s sharp stock market drop had not changed the Fed’s view that the United States economy was sound, remarks that helped shaken markets regain confidence. His remarks came a day after the US stock market suffered its worst slide since 2001.
Two major bus lines were affected on Thursday as the South African Transport and Allied Workers’ Union (Satawu) embarked on a national strike. Union spokesperson Ronnie Mamba said 104 Translux and City to City bus trips were affected. Fifty-two buses had not left Johannesburg on scheduled daily national and international trips and a further 52 Gauteng-bound buses were also affected.
A burglar broke into a café in northern Zimbabwe in the dead of night, packed his loot and promptly fell asleep, it was reported on Thursday. Police in the town of Bindura had an easy job catching their man as he only woke up when he was being handcuffed, the official Herald newspaper reported.
French drugmaker Sanofi-Aventis has launched a new cheap and easy-to-take combination pill to fight malaria that could help reduce deaths from the killer disease in Africa, it said on Thursday. Sanofi will sell the drug at no profit for less than for adults and 50 cents for children under five years old.
The Zimbabwean government has admitted that state agents are jamming radio broadcasts by foreign stations deemed hostile to President Robert Mugabe’s government, state media reported on Thursday. "We cannot allow foreigners to invade our airwaves without our authority," Bright Matonga, the Deputy Minister of Information and Publicity, was quoted as saying.
Equatorial Guinea has begun supplying fuel-starved Zimbabwe with oil at favourable terms for an unspecified period, Zimbabwe President Robert Mugabe said. ”They are providing us with crude oil at favourable terms. We only have to pay after every three months,” Mugabe said on Wednesday night in Windhoek.
Cricket’s world governing body says that players at the upcoming World Cup will be target tested for drugs. In addition to the already announced four random tests at each match, the International Cricket Council (ICC) says that 17 of the scheduled 51 games in the Caribbean will be selected for additional testing.
Pakistan pace bowlers Shoaib Akhtar and Mohammad Asif have been ruled out of the World Cup due to injury, a senior cricket board official said on Thursday. The double withdrawal comes just five months after the pair tested positive for the anabolic steroid nandrolone and were banned by their national board before an appeal panel cleared them to play again.